“A collection of profound and epic album reviews and musical articles by former astronaut and brain surgeon, Alasdair Kennedy. Reaching levels of poetry that rival Keats and Blake, the following reviews affirm Alasdair to be a prodigy, a genius and a god whose opinion is always objectively right. He is also without a doubt the most modest man in the universe.” - Alasdair Kennedy

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Wednesday, 12 August 2015

THE BEST AND WORST NEW TRACKS OF THE WEEK 12/08/2015: Roisin Murphy, Foals, Aston Merryweather and more...

Once again, I round up my favourite and least favourite singles from the last seven days. This week, the chick from Moloko gets weird and the dude from JLS gets stupid.

THE BEST:

'Evil
Eyes' - Roisin Murphy

One half of the nineties dance-pop duo Moloko, Roisin Murphy
delivers this new weird and wonderful solo track. It’s a sonic journey consisting
of electronic bleeps, massive chord splashes and funky guitars accompanied by slightly-occult
themed lyrics about love. The music video is a bit of a trip. What’s the chicken-eating
scene all about?

'Pet U' - Curl Up

Dedicated to his pet cat, this cute EDM instrumental from
New York producer Curl Up combines shimmering guitars and vibrant synth stabs.
The result sounds like something out of a brightly-coloured Japanese video
game. A video game, I can only assume, containing lots of cats. Clearly Curl Up
is quite fond of felines – his facebook profile picture even has him cradling
one.

'A Knife In
The Ocean' - Foals

Oxford rock band, Foals, have exchanged the groovy funk rock
sound of their last LP for a more slow and brooding sonic feel. The
reverb-drenched guitars make this track sound absolutely colossal. I picture
myself standing on a cliff whilst listening to this, hearing it echo at me from
across the void.

'Real Joy' – Fono

Get your Zoolander ‘Blue steel’ face on and start vogueing.
The wavy detuned fifth chords make for perfect catwalk material. I first heard
this song whilst being dragged round New Look so maybe that’s why all I can
think of whilst listening to this is clothes and fashion.

'Hidden' – Chagall

Amsterdam-based singer and producer Chagall crafts this
gloomy and atmospheric experimental pop song. The scary flecks of industrial electronica
peppered throughout had me poised on the edge of my seat, half-expecting the
whole thing to plummet into some freaky dark techno breakdown. I’m a little
relieved it didn’t.

THE WORST:

'Get Stupid' - Aston Merryweather

It’s impossible to hate this song because it’s so stupidly
feelgood. However, Aston Merryweather sounds so stupidly similar to Bruno Mars
and the instrumental sounds so stupidly similar to Blurred Lines and the title sounds so stupidly similar to 'Get Lucky' that I can’t
help but get annoyed by how stupidly derivative it all is.